- Banks and Crypto point fingers over the postponed market structure markup, which failed to hold as earlier scheduled for Thursday.
- Despite the failure of the Market Structure markup to hold as planned, the path forward still looks bright, based on signals from industry leaders and lawmakers.
Wall Street and the crypto industry seem to be pointing fingers at each other over the postponement of the Digital Asset Market Structure legislation markup, earlier scheduled for January. Amid the differences, White House officials, industry stakeholders, and legislators are optimistic about the advancement of the legislation.
Crypto Industry Rejects Draft, Blames Banking Lobby
The Senate Banking Committee Chair, Tim Scott, announced a pause in the markup proceedings for the Market Structure bill on Wednesday, citing continued efforts between both sides of the political divide to produce the best possible version of the bill that will secure the future of American finance.
Wall Street infused the latest draft of the legislation with its interests in a way that stifled competition from the crypto industry and undermined the fundamental ethos of decentralized finance. These anti-crypto banking interests ultimately led to the withdrawal of support from industry leaders like Coinbase and many Republican lawmakers.
Coinbase, alongside the majority of Republicans, will not support the banking monopolization move to prohibit stablecoin yields in the CLARITY Act. Neither will they stand for the de facto ban on tokenized equities or the clampdown on the CFTC’s regulatory authority.
An analyst, Shanaka Perera, stated that US banking lobbies wrote themselves a “$6.6 trillion protection bill” in the CLARITY Act. In his view, banks evaded the more enduring path of using innovation to quell crypto competition and instead chose to weaponize legislation against their arch-rivals.
“This is Dodd-Frank for digital assets. Incumbents writing rules that crush competitors. Regulatory capture so brazen that they published the lobbying letters on their own websites,” stated Perera, who also described the situation as “the largest regulatory capture event in American financial history.”
Lawmakers and Industry Leaders See Bright Future For Market Structure
While lawmakers like Senator Lummis subtly attributed the markup delay to the crypto industry’s lack of readiness to advance Market Structure, many tend to overlook the banking lobby’s passive, yet significant role in this legislative gridlock, which has lingered since around mid-2025.
From a more ethical point of view, the banking industry’s choice to ram crypto into subservience through legislation does not favor average retail investors. It denies them stablecoin rewards, which are substantially higher than traditional bank interests, revokes their DeFi freedoms, and ultimately waters down American financial innovation.
As the crypto industry laments another delay of the Market Structure review, US Senators and crypto industry leaders express optimism about the bill’s bright future. Alongside Chair Scott, Senators Lummis and Bill Hagerty are confident about a more agreeable bipartisan draft in the short term.
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